The Barna Group just released their newest research on teenagers' views and usage of pornography (
full article here). This info-graph compares the "moral scale" of +25 year olds to 13-24 year olds, and when you compare the percentages and rankings, it's pretty easy to see that the next generation of adults are much more reluctant to want to categorize things as "wrong" than we are.
For example, if this is accurate, 25% of future adults will not see anything wrong with having a romantic relationship with someone other than their future husband or wife, probably neglecting marriage all together.
From Barna's "What the Research Means" section:
"There appears to be a momentous generational shift underway in how pornography is perceived, morally speaking, within our culture,” says Roxanne Stone, editor in chief at Barna Group and one of the lead designers and analysts on the study. “This shift is particularly notable when it comes to personal choice regarding pornography use. But these attitudes and preferences toward porn among the younger generations need to take into account the broader social and cultural context that American young people inhabit."
"For one, they are coming of age in a culture that has given preference to personal experience and personal morality,” continues Stone. “Amy Poehler summed it up nicely, ‘Good for you, not for me.’ Americans are increasingly uncomfortable prescribing a morality for other people—and aren’t eager to have someone else prescribe one for them. Teens and young adults have
embraced this ethos and in turn place a high value on personal freedom and autonomy, tending to shirk restrictions, particularly censorship."
"Further, the mainstream acceptance of pornography, and the broader pornification of popular culture send a powerful message to young people about the moral condition of porn. We’ve seen cultural icons such as Kim Kardashian, Paris Hilton and Miley Cyrus generously rewarded for their
public displays of private moments. And now, with broadcast tools at their fingertips, young people have the ability to produce their own personal pornography—via Instagram, Snapchat or just plain ‘sexting.’ Such personal, interactive porn is something we are calling ‘Porn 2.0’ and we will be releasing more of our research on that in the coming months."
"These realities are fueling more cavalier attitudes and high rates of porn usage among the younger generations,” says Stone. “This is concerning for a number of reasons:
studies have shown that seeing a vast amount of pornography long before becoming sexually active can have damaging effects because of the amount of sexual conditioning that occurs in adolescence. Ill-timed exposure to explicit material could cause lifelong problems with relationships and personal sexual health, and create unrealistic beliefs about sex and sexuality."
What does this mean for us as parents?
I think we have to:
1 - Check our own moral code against God's. If we don't know where we stand on certain issues and WHY we take a particular stance, good luck trying to convince a teenager to follow suit.
2 - Don't let the tide of culture wash your hope out to sea. Yes, the emerging culture embraces a "my happiness first" mentality, but I know many, many teens that truly want to seek what is "true" over what "feels good to them". Deep inside of every teenager is a desire to find their place in the world, and we will always have some influence in helping them connect that with God's plan for them.
3 - Prepare yourself to be ready and jump into talk about uncomfortable things. If we choose not to verbally engage uncomfortable topics when they present themselves (like an unexpected and quite inappropriate scene coming up in a movie while watching with our children), our children will assume it's not an important enough topic to talk about, and therefore trust their opinion of truth over our opinion of truth.
